Stir Fry Chicken Bamboo Shoots in Black Bean Sauce

This tasty Stir Fry Chicken Bamboo Shoots in Black Bean Sauce has a bold umami flavor, best savored with a steaming bowl of white rice.

Seeing pandas chewing on bamboos during our recent trip to the San Diego Zoo reminded me of edible bamboo shoots, an ingredient I have not used in a while. Bamboo shoots are young sprouts harvested for food. They are crisp, tender, and similar in texture to asparagus. Their flavor is akin to that of corn. Canned bamboo shoots are easily available and packaged ones can sometimes be found at the refrigerated section of many Asian markets. Fresh bamboo shoots are harder to come by and are only available at select stores in early summer. Last week I was thrilled to find freshly boiled bamboo shoots at one of the Asian markets I frequent here in the Twin Cities. They were all huge but I managed to get one that weighed roughly a pound, perfect for this Stir Fry Chicken Bamboo Shoots in Black Bean Sauce. Please use canned bamboo shoots if you cannot find freshly boiled ones. The thicker variety is preferable to the thinner shoots as they have a milder scent and a crunchier texture.

One of the best flavorings for bamboo shoots is fermented black beans. These are actually soybeans fermented with salt and are an umami powerhouse. They are usually paired with other strong seasonings like garlic, ginger, and chilies to give it an even greater depth of flavor. Fermented black beans usually come packaged in small plastic bags. They should be rinsed prior to use to remove some of that salty flavor. For convenience, seasoned black beans in jars may be used instead.

Stir Fry Chicken Bamboo Shoots in Black Bean Sauce

This tasty Stir Fry Chicken Bamboo Shoots in Black Bean Sauce has a bold umami flavor, best savored with a steaming bowl of white rice.

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Comments

Hi Linda!
I just luvvvv fermented black beans and have them all the time from the Chinese takeaway. I’m sooo thrilled to find all these lovely recipes on your site so that I can make my own asian dishes now!!
I have the exact same jar of Black Bean Sauce as shown in your picture and was wondering – as it already contains garlic and I don’t see any mention of garlic on the bag of fermented beans – whether I should still season this recipe as you have written above. Wouldn’t that be DOUBLE seasoning it? Not that I would mind a bit of extra garlic but too much can really spoil the dish. What changes would I have to make to your recipe?

I am glad you found my blog. 🙂 I made a slightly different chicken stir fry yesterday using the black bean sauce in the jar and I still marinated my chicken and used freshly minced garlic even though the sauce already has soy sauce, wine, and garlic in it. I omitted the salt as the sauce itself is quite salty. You can choose to leave out the soy sauce and rice wine in the chicken marinade if you prefer but I think the freshly minced garlic will give the dish better flavor.